In the First Part of this comment we have seen that reference to article 51 of the UN Chapter in order to justify Operation Serval, is problematic. We will now discuss the two other legal arguments used by France.

Consent of the Malian Authorities

The argument according to which the authorities of Mali had the sovereign right to request external military intervention against the Islamist rebels and that France had the right to intervene on the basis of this invitation seems a priori powerful. Indeed, in her comments to the press just before the start of Operation Serval, Susan Rice, the U.S. Permanent Representative to the United Nations, argued that any State “can support and encourage the Malian government’s sovereign request for assistance from friends and partners in the region and beyond’ and that “there was clear-cut consensus about the gravity of the situation and the right of the Malian authorities to seek what assistance they can receive”.

One week after France launched its military intervention (“Operation Serval”) in Mali, there seems to be a general consensus concerning the legality of this intervention. Indeed, as the French Minister of Foreign Affairs Laurent Fabius rightly emphasized, France has not received a single protest concerning this intervention. On the contrary, the number of expressions of support is overwhelming: many individual States, regional organizations (including ECOWAS), the UN Secretary General and the members of the UN Security Council themselves have expressed their support and understanding. Even the rare States who expressed their opposition to this intervention did not challenge its legality. This contrasts with various military interventions in the past which were met with strong criticism and seems to indicate that no State doubts the legality of the French intervention in Mali.